Managing a Multilevel Foreign Policy is a helpful resource for enhancing current understanding of the European Union as an emerging actor in the global system. Analyzing the role of the EU in international affairs, Foradori, Rosa, and Scartezzini seek to foster understanding of the complexity of the present international conditions and the ways in which the EU is responding to threats and opportunities from the outside world. The numerous contributors examine the latest developments in the fields of EU foreign, security, and defense policies, providing a complete overview of the ways in which the EU has grown as a global actor with a significant impact on international affairs.

Italy, although it considers itself to be a middle-sized power on par with France, the United Kingdom, and Germany, has been incapable of playing an international role comparable to theirs, instead keeping a low-profile foreign policy. This has not been due to any material constraints—Italy’s profile has remained consistently low, through economic times both good and bad—but rather to the country’s strategic culture, a mixture of realpolitik and pacifist tendencies. This book sets out to analyze the influence of Italy’s strategic culture on its foreign policy. It conducts an exploratory case study to show if hypotheses generated by the strategic culture approach can shed some light on the puzzling Italian behavior in the international arena (puzzling because Italy shows a less assertive foreign policy vis-à-vis other middle powers in the same rank). The first chapter considers the main interpretations of Italian foreign policy and their limitations. The second and third chapters review the literature on strategic culture, stressing its utility for the Italian case. The fourth chapter describes the country’s strategic culture through the Liberal, Fascist, and Republican periods, and the fifth chapter analyzes the influence of ideational factors on Italy’s behavior abroad. Conclusions sum up the various emerging evidences. Scholars of political science, international relations, strategic studies, and comparative politics will find this work to be of interest.

This open access book summarizes research being pursued within the FENIX project, funded by the EU community under the H2020 programme, the goal of which is to design a new product service paradigm able to promote innovative business models, to open added value to the vessels and to create new market segments. It experiments and validates its approach on three new concepts of added-value specialized vessels able to run requested services for several maritime sectors in the most effective, efficient, economic valuable and eco-friendly way. The three vessels share the same lean design methodology, IoT tools and HPC simulation strategy: a lean fact-based design model approach, which combines real operative data at sea with lean methodology, to support the development and implementation of the vessel concepts; IT customized tools to enable the acquisition, processing and usage of on board and local weather data, through an IoT platform, to provide business services to different stakeholders; HPC simulation, providing a virtual towing tank environment, for early vessel design improvement and testing. The book demonstrates that an integrated LCC analysis and LCC strategy to guarantee sustainability to vessels concepts and the proper environmental attention inside the maritime industry.

This open access book summarizes research being pursued within the CIRC-UITS project, funded by the European Union community under the Horizon Europe programme, the goal of which is to demonstrate the improvement of circularity of automotive and mass electronics sectors by recovering materials from waste products, as well as supporting the reuse and remanufacturing of electronic components into new (high value) products in these sectors. To this aim, the CIRC-UITS project wants to unlock the full potentials/benefits of circular practices through digital technologies. Specifically, within the project, digital twins, augmented reality, web platforms and simulation tools have been developed. Another important objective is the increase of resource efficiency/independency and reduction of the negative environmental footprint of electronics production processes through circular behaviors. To this aim, within the CIRC-UITS project a set of methodologies and decision-support tools for the assessment and advisory of sustainability and circularity performances have been developed. Another important objective is the improvement/standardization of information/data sharing/exchange among industrial leaders involved in the same and/or similar value chain. To this aim, the CIRC-UITS project’s consortium has been actively involved in the development of two CEN Workshop Agreements, one about the implementation of a Digital Product Passport (DPP) dedicated to electronic components and another dedicated to the application of the standard EN 45554 in the automotive industry. Finally, the CIRC-UITS project demonstrated the benefits coming from the adoption of a Digital Circular Economy through 4 pilots, one on Electronic Control Units (ECU), one on Tire Pressure Monitoring Sensors (TPMS), one on In-Mold Electronics (IME) and one on sorting of obsolete Printed Circuit Boards (PCB) from washing machines.

This book addresses the under-researched discourse of the evolution of Chinese nuclear posture, and in particular, explains the absence from this evolution of a coherent and well-defined operational doctrine. Using a neoclassical realist framework, the book explains why China, after having launched a crash programme in the mid-1950s to develop a nuclear deterrent, did not debate a clear operational doctrine with respect to targeting and employment until the mid-1980s.

Managing a Multilevel Foreign Policy is a helpful resource for enhancing current understanding of the European Union as an emerging actor in the global system. Analyzing the role of the EU in international affairs, Foradori, Rosa, and Scartezzini seek to foster understanding of the complexity of the present international conditions and the ways in which the EU is responding to threats and opportunities from the outside world. The numerous contributors examine the latest developments in the fields of EU foreign, security, and defense policies, providing a complete overview of the ways in which the EU has grown as a global actor with a significant impact on international affairs.

Italy, although it considers itself to be a middle-sized power on par with France, the United Kingdom, and Germany, has been incapable of playing an international role comparable to theirs, instead keeping a low-profile foreign policy. This has not been due to any material constraints—Italy’s profile has remained consistently low, through economic times both good and bad—but rather to the country’s strategic culture, a mixture of realpolitik and pacifist tendencies. This book sets out to analyze the influence of Italy’s strategic culture on its foreign policy. It conducts an exploratory case study to show if hypotheses generated by the strategic culture approach can shed some light on the puzzling Italian behavior in the international arena (puzzling because Italy shows a less assertive foreign policy vis-à-vis other middle powers in the same rank). The first chapter considers the main interpretations of Italian foreign policy and their limitations. The second and third chapters review the literature on strategic culture, stressing its utility for the Italian case. The fourth chapter describes the country’s strategic culture through the Liberal, Fascist, and Republican periods, and the fifth chapter analyzes the influence of ideational factors on Italy’s behavior abroad. Conclusions sum up the various emerging evidences. Scholars of political science, international relations, strategic studies, and comparative politics will find this work to be of interest.

This open access book summarizes research being pursued within the FENIX project, funded by the EU community under the H2020 programme, the goal of which is to design a new product service paradigm able to promote innovative business models, to open added value to the vessels and to create new market segments. It experiments and validates its approach on three new concepts of added-value specialized vessels able to run requested services for several maritime sectors in the most effective, efficient, economic valuable and eco-friendly way. The three vessels share the same lean design methodology, IoT tools and HPC simulation strategy: a lean fact-based design model approach, which combines real operative data at sea with lean methodology, to support the development and implementation of the vessel concepts; IT customized tools to enable the acquisition, processing and usage of on board and local weather data, through an IoT platform, to provide business services to different stakeholders; HPC simulation, providing a virtual towing tank environment, for early vessel design improvement and testing. The book demonstrates that an integrated LCC analysis and LCC strategy to guarantee sustainability to vessels concepts and the proper environmental attention inside the maritime industry.

This open access book summarizes research being pursued within the CIRC-UITS project, funded by the European Union community under the Horizon Europe programme, the goal of which is to demonstrate the improvement of circularity of automotive and mass electronics sectors by recovering materials from waste products, as well as supporting the reuse and remanufacturing of electronic components into new (high value) products in these sectors. To this aim, the CIRC-UITS project wants to unlock the full potentials/benefits of circular practices through digital technologies. Specifically, within the project, digital twins, augmented reality, web platforms and simulation tools have been developed. Another important objective is the increase of resource efficiency/independency and reduction of the negative environmental footprint of electronics production processes through circular behaviors. To this aim, within the CIRC-UITS project a set of methodologies and decision-support tools for the assessment and advisory of sustainability and circularity performances have been developed. Another important objective is the improvement/standardization of information/data sharing/exchange among industrial leaders involved in the same and/or similar value chain. To this aim, the CIRC-UITS project’s consortium has been actively involved in the development of two CEN Workshop Agreements, one about the implementation of a Digital Product Passport (DPP) dedicated to electronic components and another dedicated to the application of the standard EN 45554 in the automotive industry. Finally, the CIRC-UITS project demonstrated the benefits coming from the adoption of a Digital Circular Economy through 4 pilots, one on Electronic Control Units (ECU), one on Tire Pressure Monitoring Sensors (TPMS), one on In-Mold Electronics (IME) and one on sorting of obsolete Printed Circuit Boards (PCB) from washing machines.

This book addresses the under-researched discourse of the evolution of Chinese nuclear posture, and in particular, explains the absence from this evolution of a coherent and well-defined operational doctrine. Using a neoclassical realist framework, the book explains why China, after having launched a crash programme in the mid-1950s to develop a nuclear deterrent, did not debate a clear operational doctrine with respect to targeting and employment until the mid-1980s.